Super Mario Kart
August 27, 1992 ** September 1, 1992 ** January 21, 1992 *'Virtual Console:' ** June 9, 2009 ** November 23, 2009 ** April 2, 2010 |genre = Racing |modes = 1-2 players}}Super Mario Kart (styled as SUPER MARIOKART and abbreviated to SMK) is the very first video game in the ''Mario Kart'' series, made for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System in September 1992. Later was pre-installed on to the Super NES Classic Edition in September 2017, 25 years after its original release. Players race go-karts as one of eight characters from the Super Mario series and aim for the gold. Gameplay Super Mario Kart can be played by one or two players. All gameplay uses a forced split-screen view. In single-player mode, the top part of the screen displays the course in behind-kart view, while the bottom half of the screen can either display a rear-view mirror perspective, or an overhead view of the whole track, displaying where all the racers are at the moment. In multiplayer, the bottom screen is assigned to the second player's view. Controls * - Accelerate, Rocket Start * - Use items, stop item roulette * - Pause/Select * - Switch view * - Steer/Navigate menu * - Switch view * - Brake * / : Drift/jump Modes Single Player Modes Mario GP The first single-player mode is Mario GP (later known as Grand Prix), in which one player races seven computer-controlled drivers. Engine classes of 50cc, 100cc, and 150cc are available, but 150cc must be unlocked by beating the game in 100cc difficulty. Larger engines result in faster vehicles and as such a greater level of difficulty. There are four cups to select: the Mushroom Cup, the Flower Cup, the Star Cup, and the Special Cup. The Special Cup must be unlocked by winning gold in the other three Cups, in 100cc mode. Each cup consists of five tracks, and the player must finish the race in fourth place or better to advance to the next track. Racers ranked fifth to last are "RANKED OUT" and are forced to either use a continue to try again if applicable (Thus so losing a kart), or retire and end the game. All tracks are five laps long. If the player presses & at the same time, the selected character will be small until the player presses the buttons together again. Mario GP scoring process In order to win the cup, the player must have the highest total number of points at the end of the fifth track of the cup. Points are awarded at the end of each track, as follows : #9 points, #6 points, #3 points, #1 point. Ending the cup as 1st to 3rd gives the player the gold, silver or bronze cup respectively while ending in 4th do not award any cup. The character is shown during the award ceremony near the podium, crying while the first three CPU racers celebrate and rejoice, with a special theme played and a text displayed on-screen. No cup is awarded in this case, and therefore the player must restart the entire cup, in hopes of achieving a better performance. Time Trial Time Trial mode has the player race through one track of his/her own choice, with the racer of its choice, in an attempt to set a record for the best lap or overall course time. Due to the SNES's hardware limitations, the times recorded are deleted as soon the console is turned off. All items are taken out in this mode, and so the times achieved rely solely on driving skills. If the driving session is perfect (no falling, spin out or offroad), the ghost can eventually reappear on following sessions, allowing the player to further improve his/her driving skills. Multiplayer Modes Mario GP Mario GP mode plays just like the single-player version, but with one less computer-controlled driver. In order to proceed to the next track, only one player must rank in the top four. The first player will receive a Game Over if they rank out three times, and the other player continues alone. Match Race Match Race mode (later known as VS. Mode), pits the two players in a one-on-one race on any track. Battle Mode In Battle Mode, two players choose from four battle arenas specially designed for Battle Mode and try to pop the three balloons surrounding the other player (representing their lives) by hitting them with items such as Koopa shells or banana peels. The last player with at least one balloon wins. Racers The eight available drivers can be classified by four attributes: top speed, steering, strength, and acceleration. The eight characters are grouped in pairs, each pair sharing the same stats and having the same bonus to a particular attribute. Here are the racers : Tracks Super Mario Kart ''features a total of 20 race tracks, divided into four cups of five each. Tracks with numbers are part of a series, which means that all tracks with the same name but different numbers are set in the same universe, and as such share the same name, background, track elements, enemies, obstacles and music theme. This was due to the SNES hardware limitations of the time, that did not allow the original ''Mario Kart game from having all-distinctive courses. The game could only handle eight different universes, and Rainbow Road is the only one that has an entire universe for its own, having an exclusive background, enemies (Rainbow Thwomps), name and theme song. In Mario Kart DS and so on, the original console abbreviation (SNES) is put before the track name (ex. SNES Donut Plains 3). In later games after this one, cups only have four courses instead of five. This track is available in Mario Kart 8 with The Legend of Zelda DLC or Mario Kart 8 Deluxe. Battle stages Super Mario Kart has its own Battle Mode dedicated stages to battle on. These aren't circuits, but battle arenas instead. World Records Like all other Mario Kart games, Super Mario Kart has its own Time Trial World Records. Here is a list of the current times for each course. NTSC version (Japan, North America, Brazil, ...) For an up-to-date version and for 1-lap records, see the official NTSC world records page PAL version (Europe, ...) For an up-to-date version and for 1-lap records, see the official PAL world records page Items Items are either offensive or supportive and are picked up when driving over a yellow "?" tile sitting on the track. The probabilities of receiving a particular item are dependent on the place the player is in, with more powerful items such as Stars and Thunderbolts given when the player is further back. The exception to this being the CPU players, who all have an unlimited amount of a certain item, such as Princess Toadstool and Toad's Poison Mushrooms, Mario and Luigi's infinite stars or Bowser's Fireballs. Gallery Production Credits Executive Producer : Hiroshi Yamauchi Producer : Shigeru Miyamoto Programmers : Masato Kimura, Hajime Yajima, Kenji Yamamoto C.G. Designers : Tadashi Sugiyama, Naoki Mori Sound Composers : Soyo Oka, Taro Bando Illustrators : Yoichi Kotabe, Mie Yoshimura, Yoshiaki Koizumi Manual Editor : Atsushi Tejima Directors : Tadashi Sugiyama, Hidequi Konno Trivia! * This is the only game in the Mario Kart series that has a two-player maximum for multiplayer. Later games would allow up to four players (or eight) to play at the same time. *This game did not feature any unlockables other than the 150cc engine class and the Special Cup for the 100cc and 150cc classes. *In the Western manuals, the vehicle known as a kart was incorrectly spelled with a "C" when talking about the number of remaining karts which can decrease by one by restarting a race after giving up or placing 5th-8th. *In Mario Kart: Super Circuit all the tracks from Super Mario Kart can be unlocked. However they are known as "Extra Tracks" and the gameplay is exactly the same as it normally is in Super Circuit. (The characters, items and graphics are still the same) * This is the only Mario Kart game on which cups have five courses instead of four. This excludes the Extra Cups in Mario Kart: Super Circuit. *This is the only official Mario Kart game where Donkey Kong and Wario do not appear as playable characters, and this is also the one and only official Mario Kart game in which Donkey Kong Jr. is a playable character. The eponymous game having been a commercial and critical failure, the character was scrapped in future games, in favour of his much more popular "senior" counterpart. *The Poison Mushroom that is used only by CPU-controlled Toadstool and Toad is not a true Poison Mushroom in most cases. Unlike other games, it shrinks the driver who hits it while at normal size, but enlarges the driver back to his/her normal size when small. It takes on more of the appearance of a Golden Mushroom with red spots than an actual Poison Mushroom seen in Super Mario Bros : The Lost Levels (Japanese Super Mario bros. 2), which is indigo and bears a skull. *The 3D-like textures featured in the game (Mode 7 texture mapping) were an advanced process in the time, and as such the game cartridges had superior quality hardware to cope with the game's needs. *Special Items deployed by CPU characters cannot damage other CPU racers. Whenever they are about to collide with them, they simply jump as if they had a Feather. However, sometimes they simply can't avoid them, and they get hit anyway. *Because of the game storage limitations, both Mario and Luigi share the same body textures, with a simple color palette swap for differencing the two characters, which is commonly used in the NES games. Only their faces have distinct tiles. *The original Japanese version of the game features Peach and Bowser drinking from a champagne bottle on the podium at the end of the cups, should they win. Due to the alcohol-consumption policies running at the time in the western world, this ending was removed in both American & European versions of the game, and replaced by Peach throwing the bottle in the air, and Bowser just holding the bottle. de: pt-br: Category:Games Category:Home console games * Category:Mario Kart series